aloha tiki tribe!
This was tonight's sunset. Nice red VOG-tinged, as the fire ball sank over the pacific rim...
And, (seg-way) speaking of "Pacific Rim", some one asked me a question I''d never been asked before .
"Do I do anything to "warm-up" before I make art, or start painting."

Hmmm, that's a good question.

Sometimes I'm revved up if my "Low-Brow-Art Muse" is around, and I don't need a warm up.

BUT, if he's not, I gotta' get the "art-juices" flowing... sometimes I sketch. But, that can also just eat up all your Art-Juice.
So, I look to warm up on something a little more simple, that has guidelines to follow so you don't have to think about it too much.
Something that brings back my childhood joy of making art.

It also helps shut off my "monkey-brain".

MONKEY-BRAIN - That means all the day-to-day jabbering & worries about non-important (in the big picture Art Way).... unimportant things.
UNIMPORTANT THINGS: Oh, like paying the rent, or paying the bills, and time lines, and dead lines...
...all that has to be tuned way down.
I need little to NO MONKEY BRAIN JABBERING.

...so I can hear my "Low-Brow-Art Muse"... because he usually mutters in a quiet, rum slurred, low, smoky lounge, kinda' voice.

That doesn't mean I don't have on music.
I LOVE listening to things while I work.
Music: I have special mixes, like a "Tiki/exotica-Mix" and a " Rock-a-Billy Brian Setzer Mix) and a "Heavy Metal Mix" and a "Ambient-zone out mix" all depending on the mood I'm seeking.
I have a big collection of CDs, cause I went through a time when for years I was buying sound tracks to movies.
Like, I have every John Carpenter sound track. I love his low, thumping beats- such as "Escape From New York" & "The Fog" ..like that.

I also love listening to audio Books. I love reading, but I don't have time for that any more... sad.

Anyways... But, back to the warm up... the other thing that quiets my brain & gets my hands going - remembering how to hold a brush, and mix colors, and slap on paint...
I paint old toys or figures like monsters and robots.
When I was a kid I loved to build and paint monster models.

AS A MATTER OF FACT: A lot of how I first learned how to paint comes from me doing that as a kid.
-first learning how to hold a brush, and how to mix colors.

So, the WARM UP is...
... sometimes I grab an old toy (or maybe a new one - I have some long-long-time-friends who know my strange taste in "weird old things", and they surf the net, or thrift ships, and every blue moon they will send me a little treasure.
They know I will dig. They send it in for a trade for an art print or a sketch they saw me doing on line and they want.. and like that.

That's why I have a shelf of universal movie monsters above my art table, and boxes of dinosaurs and things in my garage,
all waiting one day for a bigger art-studio so they can be displayed.
They also come in handy every once in a while as models to draw from.
I hear Mark Ryden is big on this too, so I don't feel so weird letting people know I ..yes ...I have a bunch of toys.

Sometimes, I hunt for things myself. I have a few old resin figures I got in Thailand from a street vendor in the Night Market. One figure is of "Sun; the Monkey-god".
The Monkey-god : That I STILL don't think I'm skilled enough to paint properly yet. But, he sits on the shelf... waiting. Poor old Son has been waiting for more than a decade!

Right now, however, I'm going through my Godzilla kick... again, ...or still, I guess.
That is how I got some figures from Pacific Rim.
And Of course, new toys these days have TONS of little sculpted details. Perfect to paint on.
I don't actually finish a whole lot of them, they are kind of NEVER finished... but I work on them.

My one REALLY finished is a Creature from the Black Lagoon. Many many green scales on him.

Anywhos... the recent warm up has been Knifehead from "Pacific Rim".
He's got blue and purple and green. Colors I love putting together.
Sometimes I figure out cool color combos for paintings that way too.

Yeah, my studio looks like a ten year old's room. But one of my best 'learn how to paint' books is "The Fantasy Art Techniques of Tim Hildbrandt" - Great Book, Excellent BOOK! ...and he's got a life time of toys, dinosaurs, dragons, and stuff in boxes in his studio... many end up in his paintings in various ways.

It all ways helps to see how light really looks reflecting off a wing, or a tail or a claw, or something a human model just can't be...

Brad's Imaginary Low-Brow-Art Muse Sez:
"Great. Give away all your tricks!
Oh well, guess it's good to give back to the "universe".
So, by-the-way, what has all that warming up done for ya?"

Oh yeah, here's me finishing up the tropical plants. Getting the sunset creeping down the pavement...

Makin' d' Tiki-Art...
AP (Artist Proof) #1 of 10 has already been SOLD for this painting "The Red Tiki Lounge".
I'm honored that it's going into the collection of an artist who has influenced and inspired me, my art, and my career since I started working in LA, back in 1980. He became a friend, and mentor, and helped me through a lot and taught me what it is to be an artist... and even though we now live thousands of miles apart, he still does so. Big Mahalo!

See this Art-Book?
It's a copy of "Malicious Resplendence - the Paintings of Robt. Williams".
The book's opened to a well dog-eared page. The page is splattered with paint, because it's been open through many sessions of me making art. It's been my visual reference and inspiration while I slap paint on canvas many times.

I tell you "This is the First Low-Brow Painting I ever saw."

It was in the late 80's or early 90's I think, and I saw it first as an ART PRINT at Hi De Ho Comics in Santa Monica. When I looked at it, I felt my (then) Punker Buzz-Cut prickle as sweat ran down my scalp from my over heated & over aroused brain.

The painting was totally bitchin'!
It freaked me out! It
Blew my mind!

I did not know you could paint cartoon-like images and call them "Art". This changed everything. Finally, I understood good "Art". Art with a capital "A".

Something years at UCLA didn't teach me. As a matter of fact, I was thrown out of an advanced painting course there because I was told things like this were NOT "Art". If that's the sort of thing I was going to paint I better get out and go look for a commercial illustrator job.

However, this new cartoon "Art" proved that was wrong. This RAWKED my world. It mutated my DNA… transmogrified me from a commercial illustrator into a gallery Artist.
I had discovered Robert Williams and I had found "Low-Brow Art".

The painting is named "Patrick has a Glue Dream".

The Comic shop folks showed me the books "Zombie Mystery Paintings by Robt. Williams ", and "Visual Addiction the Art of Robt. Williams" and, best of all, "The Low-Brow Art of Robt. Williams."

This changed my career and my life as an Artist. It took years to turn the train around, but I finally did. It's hard to change after you learn to make $ a certain way, then give that momentum and reputation up, and start all over again from nothing.

But this is the painting that did it.

What's funny is, I finally met Robert Williams at the 25th Anniversary Group Art show at La Luz De Jesus Gallery. I told him one of his paintings completely changed my life. He Asked which one.

And I drew a complete blank.

After untold hours of looking at it, studying it, I could not remember it's name! Worse case of being "star-struck" I've ever had. I died right there in front of my hero. He looked at me like I was some kinda' idiot… I started to disscribe it's utterly impossible image, and failed! Then, I was distracted with some excited and very nice, fans asking me to sign their "25th Anniversary Show books". Mr. Williams got an odd look on his face and wandered off, with-out a word. E-gads!

My heart, cracked, broke, and stopped.

Luckily, later that night as the massive crowd thinned out some, I found him again. I timidly approached. At first, he gave me a look like "Oh no, not that nut again." But, after I was finally able to explain to him which painting had changed my life, he slowly cracked a wise "father of Low-Brow Art" smirk.

Aloha Tiki Tribe!
I gotta attend a friends memorial... an early morning "paddle-out" (on surf boards) to a boat where his ashes will be spread over the south bay where he grew up, learned to surf, invented the wet-suit, raised a ship wreck... amazing guy. Uncle Bob. I knew him for about 10 years, while I worked with Body Glove. Got to be friends with him in the last 4 years or so. Bob Meistrell, the founder of Body Glove passed away, and I and my partner /art agent, have been asked to be a part of the "paddle-out ceremony" by Uncle Bob's nephew - the now owner of BG. So, jeeze... can't really say no to a request like that. Anywhos, I may not be posting for a few. That means I'm off island. Big Aloha! BP~
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Aloha tiki Tribe!
Well, had a great and very emotional and moving experience at the Uncle bob memorial paddle out on Sunday. A red eye flight to Manhattan Beach, then to the Beach, got into a wet suit (the California water is COLD compared to Hawaiian waters!) grabbed a board, and we paddled out to the 70ft disappearance boat, along with hundreds of other surfers and swimmers, and water babies, ) some great shots on my FB page. Check it out here: https://www.facebook.com/bradtikisharkparker

I am getting a bit edgy from all the business meetings and not painting, but I got to walk into a HUGE freakin Art supply store today - BLICKS- and bought some sweet art sketch books. Back on da' island soon... ALOHA!

Brad I remember Robert Williams did artwork for the Guns n Roses album "Appetite for Destruction" which was my first record I bought as a kid, I thought it was the coolest art for an album that I had ever seen up to that point.

Aloha Tiki Tribe!
I'm finally back on the island!
It was a great trip... even though I kinda' hate traveling, but it was important, and felt great being part of some important parts of Body Glove's history.

Anyways - YEAH, Robert Williams - my hero!
Kai Koa - that was a very neat way that alot of folks discovered his art, and I think it was a major stepping stone in the growth of Low-Brow Art.

A good book that shows all Robt. Williams Early "Super Cartoons" like that painting, (and which also shows the "underpainting" he did on it.) The book also shows his other early work which are equally as well rendered "super cartoons" that broke down the walls of cartoons and fine art.
Get the book "Malicious Resplendence" the paintings of Robt Williams.
Shows the birth of the Low-Brow Art movement, and Robt. Williams' wisdom and wit are just as enormous as his painting talent. A great book.

Aloha Tiki Tribe!
So first day I got to be in my art studio... after being away for days.... I got a real twitch About not making art. I really feel like a big looser when I can't make art...that my purpose in life is not happening. Don't know what I'd do if I could not make art, but when we were in LA, and showing our business partner from Oman (the middle East) around different parts, one being down town LA, and skid row... (no we were not making a tour of it, just headed to the flower mart to grab some cheap flowers for a visit to forest lawn) anyways, I pointed out the car window and said, if I could not make art, I'd most likely be living in a card board box like one of those poor souls.
But, right now, the Tiki Gods have different plans for me, so here whats going on ...painting.... (oh yessss!)

Here's the painting I'm making- "The RED TIKI LOUNGE"
IT feels so good to be working on it again! I can't tell you how nice it was to be in my cluttered card board box -like studio and paint! PAINT! You don't know how lucky you are to have something like that in your life till it's taken away for a week...

Here's what I really wanted to work on ...the hot rod...the car.... I kept thinking about it, and the whole painting all week.... I was smart and took a side trip tween meetings with normal Biz to stop into a REAL art supply store. BLICKS Art Supplies on Beverly in Hollywood. WOW! Awesome Store! All so many many many the art supplies! It was blowing my mind! Cool arty LA art scene cats and goth girls working there... all so nice, and showing me every thing I could ever what...like not just "the one" sketch book they had for sale, but the ROW upon row of of Sketch Books they had for sale.... heaven! I got two, One cool hard bound like a diary, and one where you could tear out the sheets.
So, I started painting... and my "low-Brow Art muse wasn't far off. He was hanging round the studio, with plenty of inspiration that had stored up while I was away.
A lovely day painting.
Really I gotta say thanks to the tiki gods or who or what ever for this gift... the chance to do this with my life.
I met in Manhattan Beach the man who designed the Body Glove Logo. Who started "Hang Ten" the surf Brand. A really cool guy, who the wonderful folks at Body Glove made sure I was sitting next to at the big 60th Anniversary Dinner. Talk about inspiration... he was a surfer version of Robt Williams. Perhaps more a graphic designer than an artist, but darned full of wisdom.
Big Thanks to BG, and all the fine folks there.

Brad's Imaginary Low-Brow-Art Muse Sez:
"Well, gotta' tell ya... The arty people working at BLICKS art Supplies may have thought you were mentally handicapped,
that's why they were so nice to you. I mean, you asked that poor unsuspecting young woman
who worked there, (you know, the one dressed in full-on Tim Burton-style-vampire-clothing & make-up..
and NOT because it's getting near Halloween) you asked her if they had sketch books, and she showed you
the isle where they keep the sketch books, ...and then you kinda' made a scene; you dropped to your knees, and cried,
and blubbered; "Oh...My Gawd! They are all soooo beautiful!!"
Even her icy-vampiric-retail-persona weakened.
But, of course, it is LA. So, she was only a LITTLE bit weirded-out.
You got a good smirk outa' her purple & black glitter-glossy adorned lips."